“You all right?”
“Just a little tired.” It wasn’t entirely a lie. Despite traveling in the cradle of luxury, the flight had still taken hours. Add in the time difference and it meant it was nearly midnight there. “I thought it would be cooler outside.”
“Weather around here is pretty temperate year-round and August wasn’t long ago. There’s still heat lingering. Might even find the water still good for swimming.” He glanced at her, then back at the road. “We’ll be on a private beach.”
She lowered the window another few inches, wanting the wind to blow away the ideas that caused.
The road they were driving on was narrow. Winding and, aside from the gleam of moonlight, very, very dark. They might have been the only two people left in the world.
“My father took me to Paris once,” she desperately interrupted the insistent images filling her head. “I was still in college.” It was the first time he’d included her in such a manner and she’d been thrilled to accompany him to the medical conference. “But we were so busy that I never had a chance to leave the city.”
“Busy doing what?”
She was vaguely surprised that he even responded. It seemed unlikely that he was as tensely nervous as she. But still, conversation was better than silence, and it might keep her imagination under some control. “Keeping up with my father, mostly. He was presenting some new research at a conference.” She thought back, remembering. “He was amazing.”
She hadn’t been offended to be the one fetching him water or carrying his papers. And when he’d included her in his conversations—had actually seemed proud of her when she’d offered some thought or opinion—she’d felt as if she’d accomplished something truly great. “It was the first time he actually treated me like an adult.”
She felt Rourke’s glance, but he didn’t comment as he slowed the car to turn up a steep drive that seemed to appear out of nowhere. A dimly lit gate swung open for them, and once they were through, the road became even more winding and narrow.
Yet he navigated it all with obvious ease.
“I take it you’ve been here before.”
“Mmm.”
She chewed the inside of her lip. “With a woman?” She hated acknowledging the need to know.
His hesitation was barely noticeable. “None I’ve been married to.”
She couldn’t tell if it was amusement in his voice or irony.
But there was no time to dwell too long on wondering what woman—or women—had been here with him, because he pulled to a stop in a small stone-paved courtyard. “This is it.”
There was not much to see beyond the low lights that were bright enough only to point out the perimeter of the courtyard and light the way along a narrow walkway. She climbed out of the car while he was pulling their suitcases out of the trunk that had probably taken some mathematical genius to fit inside in the first place, and even though she held out her hand to take some of her own smaller items, he just ignored her and loaded the straps up on his own muscular shoulders.
She wouldn’t have thought the man would ever carry his own luggage.
“This way.” He headed toward the walkway. “Watch your step. The lighting is pretty dim and the pavers might be uneven.”
As she followed him, she also noticed that the bushes lining the walk were overgrown, which didn’t help the going any. She was glad she was wearing flats, though her gauzy ankle-length skirt wanted to snag against the overgrowth. Before long, they passed through an archway that led into another courtyard and he unlocked a wide, tall door, and led her inside.
Given his taste in homes, she shouldn’t have been surprised by the luxury that met them when he began flipping on lights as they passed through the entrance hall to a living area that rivaled his New York apartment for size. But after the rustic entryway, nevertheless, she was.
In his apartment, everything had seemed angular. Here, everything was arched—the doorways that were flanked by marble columns and the windows that were covered with shutters. The floors were gleaming stone and the furnishings all seemed to be done in soft browns. It was cool and elegant and expensively beautiful and she couldn’t help but wonder if the paintings that hung on the smooth, ivory walls were originals.
He dumped their luggage on the floor and crossed the long room to push open the shutters guarding the tall arch-shaped windows there. “I told Marta—the housekeeper—that we wouldn’t need her until tomorrow.” Lisa realized they weren’t windows at all but doors, when he pulled them right open letting in the fresh night air. “Come out and see the view.”
Nerves jumping anew, she followed him outside onto a deep terrace guarded by a majestic stone balustrade that faithfully followed the steps that crisscrossed from this level to two lower ones, and finally the ghostly white sand that led to the silver-white glisten of the sea. “It’s breathtaking,” she admitted.
“Wait until you see it at sunrise.”
“Sunrise?” She shook her head. “Thank you, no. I prefer to be sleeping at that hour.”
His white teeth flashed in a quick grin that caused her heart to smack around even more than the view had. “Some things are worth getting up for at that hour.”
She couldn’t form a response to that to save her soul.
And he knew it.
His grin deepened as he turned to go back inside. “I’ll show you the rest of the place.”
Aside from the main living area, “the place” included two kitchens, one media room, an office that Rourke said was equipped with every convenience, and a total of six bedrooms.
“This one has the best view,” he said of the very last one they came to.
And she could certainly see why.
The wide four-poster bed was positioned opposite a bank of windows that he immediately set about un-shuttering. They’d gone down a short flight of stairs to reach the room and it looked out the same direction as the living room, sharing that stellar view of the Mediterranean.
It didn’t take a genius to realize this was the room he was expecting they would share. The room. And the bed.
She kept her eyes strictly away from that particular item and went into the adjoining bathroom. Even that had windows that opened up to the view.
She pressed her palm to the knots in her belly and returned to the bedroom.
Rourke, done with the windows at last, watched her for a moment. “Marta will unpack everything in the morning. Do you want one of those suitcases for tonight?”
She hadn’t considered herself a normal bride. She hadn’t packed a trousseau. No sexy little negligees designed strictly for the purpose of enticing an eager groom. No fancy little ensembles to parade around in during the day. She’d packed what she’d had in her closet.
The only thing new that she’d worn in the past two days had been her wedding gown.
And everything beneath it.
Her mind shied away from those thoughts.
“I just need the overnighter. The small one. But I can get it.” She was already speaking to an empty room and could hear the sound of his footsteps on the half-dozen stairs that would carry him back to the living room’s level.
She let out a shaking breath, looking around the room again.
The bathroom had possessed several mirrors, but the bedroom itself contained none and for that she was grateful. There were two large armoires